Queenslanders develop IT security kit

The toolkit was developed by the Queensland Department of Justice and Attorney General in conjunction with the state's police and health services.

The toolkit CD uses an interactive questionnaire approach to allow government departments to measure their compliance against the Queensland Government's own Information Standard 18.

"[We] put together a reasonably interactive type of CD-ROM which runs through a series of questions which provides a result in certain categories," says Stephen Moskwa, the Department of Justice and Attorney's information security manager. "The government has been good at coming up with policies, procedures and standards.... this goes the next step; here's this toolkit you can use to show you how you're going."

Unlike federal government agencies, the states don't receive the clear support of the Defence Signals Directorate (DSD). The DSD is charged with helping the federal government secure its information, as well as other, more clandestine tasks like intercepting signals intelligence. "They don't have a clear mandate to support state governments," Moskwa says.

The CD-ROM was put together with the help of Microsoft and Data3.

Moskwa and others who worked on the toolkit hope state governments other than Queensland's will find it useful, and say the Victorian government has shown interest in using the kit.